club_cafe: Re: Fidelkity Investments

Myrelle on

My thinking would be, if you do not have the $$$ in the account, don't buy the stock.    That way it does not matter how long it takes the checks to be received and entered.

If we had $500 in the account, then had our monthly meeting and collected checks from all the members, we would choose a stock and then purchase as much as we could from the cash in the bank.
Then we mailed the collected checks in and looked for a good buy the following month.    If we sold stock after deciding it would be better to sell before tanking, then sometimes we would have a LOT
of cash and we would decide to buy a couple new stocks or more of whatever we had that was doing well.

We even figured out (based on the cost of commission several years ago) that we would need to purchase at least $400+ in stock before it was cost effective.

We live in a small town in the middle of the state and if we had a meeting on Wednesday, by Thursday morning a deposit letter along with the checks went out to TDAmeritrade in the large city about
125 miles away.   They received it usually on Friday, entered it and it was on our books by Monday. (If not Friday.)

TDA also allows check writing.    Do the buying and selling where you can do all the transactions and then let Bivio take over.

But then that is only one person's opinion.

Myrelle

On 3/1/2010 10:17 AM, Lynn Ostrem wrote:

Ron, you mentioned that it would be nice NOT to have two accounts. Allow me to play devil's advocate.

Club A uses a broker with check writing privileges. At Tuesday evening's meeting, the treasurer collects checks, fills out the deposit slip, stuffs it all into an envelope and drops it in the mail on Wednesday. It takes up to 2 days to get there, and up to two days to get posted. Oops! Now it's Friday. It's possible that, by the time it's posted, the market has closed. So the stock you voted to buy on Tuesday may not take place for 6 days - the following Monday. Hopefully the envelope won't get lost in the mail.

My Club has both a bank and a broker account signed up for ACH transfer (our is www.firstrade.com). Our treasurer collects the checks, fills out the deposit slip, stuffs it all into a deposit envelope, and she drops it into the night drop on the way home. Our bank processes all night deposits by 9 a,m. She verifies that it was processed (online), then she makes the ACH transfer on the broker website. The transaction is completed by the next day and we can buy our stock within 24 hours of the vote.

Some say that maintaining two accounts is a hassle. I say, "what!? are you kidding!?" We make one deposit per month, up to 6 ACH transfers per year, seldom do we write a check, and we try to buy 1 or 2 stocks per month. Maintaining two accounts in bivio might take me 2 minutes per month - probably less. The secret is to log transactions when you do them, rather than waiting until the day before the meeting when you have to reconstruct what all you did since the last meeting.

I'm all for convenience and fewer statements, but not if I have to wait a week to buy a stock. Now there are ways around that, like having everyone mail their checks to the broker by a certain date, or automatic withdrawals from their bank accounts. These are certainly viable options, but we prefer to write checks at the meetings.

Just another way of looking at it.

--
Lynn Ostrem

garbagecop@gmail.com

Crow River Investment Club

www.bivio.com/crowriver

Join me at InvestEd 2010
August 6-8, Baltimore, MD
www.investor-education2010.org

Lynn Ostrem on

I think you were very clear, Laurie. You said it would take less time with one account. That's what I disputed...the time.

I brought up the audit issue, as an aside. I know you have always advocated "trust but verify" when it comes to the books! <G> You've been very clear about that, too.

Yes, it probably would be easier if we had one account. I would have 3 transactions to post manually instead of 4. But the chance of typos on 4 entries is much less (for me anyway) than the chance of my broker carrying out a transaction 2 decimal points farther than bivio, thus creating a discrepancy that takes me 10 minutes to figure out. It balances out.

Lynn O.

Rob Nagler on

On 3/1/10, Lynn Ostrem wrote:
> transactions to post manually instead of 4. But the chance of typos on 4
> entries is much less (for me anyway) than the chance of my broker carrying
> out a transaction 2 decimal points farther than bivio, thus creating a
> discrepancy that takes me 10 minutes to figure out. It balances out.

Has this happened to you? We store calculations to 6 decimal places
(millionths of a dollar). I would be surprised if any broker store
data more precisely.

Cheers,
Rob

Lynn Ostrem on

No Rob, the decimal issue has not happened to me. As you already know, I do not use AccountSync because my little broker, Firstrade.com, has not yet become affiliated with bivio. Although, I'm sure that will happen in the future.

I have seen plenty of questions on this board from treasurers who are trying to figure out why their bivio accounts don't match up with their statements. It's not nearly as often anymore, but it still happens. My only point was, when that happens, it can take a non-financial person 10 minutes to find it.

Anyway, I'm not trying to say that AccountSync is flawed. It's not. You have given people a great tool. But it's not perfect. No tool is.

Does that help clarify?

Lynn O.

Leo Cardillo on

This is a difficult forum with which to participate, with so many different threads all coming in on top of each other, but I'll try ( once more) to offer one perspective on the recent debate.

Our club ( in business for more than fifty years) has used Account Synch for about nine months. Five months ago, we switched to Fidelity so that we could take full advantage of the automatic, nightly downloads and associated emails. The process has been bullet-proof and perfect and saves me a great deal of time and effort. The days of struggling with manual downloads and inevitable corrections, duplications, et al, are gone forever. Amen.

As but one example, recently our 200 club shares in Burlington had to be converted under a complicated merger offer from Buffet, to an equivalent amount of cash or shares in Hathaway B, or both. Heaven help us!! AccountSynch nailed the transaction precisely and immediately and without human intervention. Praise be!

We hold about thirty stocks ( too many) and about $305,000 in total value. All of the dividends, expenses, foreign taxes, merger distributions, sales and purchases - all have been automatically captured by AccountSynch and all are exactly correct to the penny. Amen.

Fidelity is our brokerage house and has every service that a club could need, including $7.95 commissions. I wrote two checks in the last six months. The online trading capability is excellent.

Today, my Assistant Treasurer and I completed a Club Audit using the Bivio seven step outline. Perfect.

Next we took the tax interview and updated a few member's addresses and SSN's and then had Bivio calculate the tax return. It took Bivio about two minutes to generate the entire return, including all supporting docs, including withdrawals for two members who passed this year. Perfect. Members will now download their K-1's from the website. Amen.

Shortly, I will open a second "club" account to track my own 401(k) account and my non-club investment account. Heaven is just around the corner...

Next, I will use ManifestInvesting on a trial basis to see if it can add to my club's perspective, which I know it will.

To paraphrase from the title of a favorite movie, Bivio's AccountSynch, combined with an appropriately compatible brokerage firm, is As Good As It Gets!!

I hope that this helps.

Best Regards,

Leo

Treasurer, 711 Investment Club

From: club_cafe@bivio.com [mailto:club_cafe@bivio.com] On Behalf Of Lynn Ostrem
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 6:31 PM
To: The Club Cafe
Subject: Re: club_cafe: Single Versus Multiple Club Financial Accounts

No Rob,�the decimal issue has not happened to me.� As you already know, I do not use AccountSync because my little broker, Firstrade.com, has not yet become affiliated with bivio.� Although, I'm sure that will�happen in the future.�

�

I�have seen plenty of questions on this board from treasurers who are trying to figure out why their bivio accounts don't match up with their statements.� It's not nearly as often anymore, but it still happens.� My only point was, when that happens, it can take a non-financial person 10 minutes to find it.�

�

Anyway, I'm not trying to say that AccountSync is flawed.� It's not.� You have given people a great tool.� But it's not perfect.� No tool is.

�

Does that help clarify?

�

Lynn O.

�

Rob Nagler on

On 3/1/10, Leo Cardillo wrote:
> emails. The process has been bullet-proof and perfect and saves me a great
> deal of time and effort. The days of struggling with manual downloads and
> inevitable corrections, duplications, et al, are gone forever. Amen.

Leo, this is music to my ears. This is exactly why we created AccountSync
nine years ago.

Thanks so much for the positive feedback.

Cheers,
Rob Nagler
Chairman & CEO
bivio Inc.

Rob Nagler on

On 3/1/10, Lynn Ostrem wrote:
> not use AccountSync because my little broker, Firstrade.com, has not yet
> become affiliated with bivio. Although, I'm sure that will happen in the
> future.

Keep on reminding us. :)

> I have seen plenty of questions on this board from treasurers who are trying
> to figure out why their bivio accounts don't match up with their statements.

There are many reasons for this, of course. I should say that our experience
is that the support costs us much less to support people who use the automatic
import feature of AccountSync than trying to help people correct manual entries.
We often have to fix the import software, but it's a fairly simple
matter to correct
the data for automatic import customers. We can't do that for manual entry
folks.

> Does that help clarify?

I think so, but we have always differed on this issue. I suspect neither of
us will be changing our minds soon. :)

Cheers,
Rob

Leo Cardillo on

How would one handle a cash withdrawal? Prior to our current brokerage
house, which offers a checking account, we had to go through quite a process
to get a check from our old broker to cover a member's withdrawal.

Same issue - in spades - when we gave a cash distribution back to the
members. I don't want to revisit those days.

We also prefer to have each member own nearly the same interest in the club.
We are much more comfortable in writing a check to cover an expense, than we
would be with some equivalent amount of units, which also distorts the
uniform participation, however slightly. I suspect the audit process is also
simpler with a check-based reimbursement.

Best regards,

Leo

-----Original Message-----
From: club_cafe@bivio.com [mailto:club_cafe@bivio.com] On Behalf Of Eric
Dobbs
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 1:19 PM
To: club_cafe@bivio.com
Subject: club_cafe: Re: Single Versus Multiple Club Financial Accounts

While we're on the subject...

A quick reminder that Ira's example last week implies a club doesn't really
need checks. Members can make extra payments into the club by paying for
club expenses which are reimbursed with units in the club.

For example:

1. A club member pays for the bivio subscription with their credit card.

2. The treasurer records a payment from that member in the amount of $99
which increased their units in the club accordingly.

3. The treasurer records the bivio subscription as a deductible expense in
the amount of $99.

No checks are necessary either for the expense itself nor to reimburse the
member. All club expenses could be treated similarly.

Eric Dobbs
bivio Inc.

Leo Cardillo on

Laurie:

How do you know which member sent the check?

Does your broker post that information when he deposits the check?

I don't believe that Fidelity will do that, as Wells Fargo did. This is one glitch that requires my intervention, admittedly, a fairly easy one.

Best Regards,

Leo

From: club_cafe@bivio.com [mailto:club_cafe@bivio.com] On Behalf Of Laurie Frederiksen
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 12:59 PM
To: 'The Club Cafe'
Subject: club_cafe: Single Versus Multiple Club Financial Accounts

Hi Lynn,

I will play devils advocate from the other perspective.

For my clubs, member payments are deposited directly to the broker before our meeting. We used to have everyone mail in checks to the broker, now they do it

using their banks automatic bill pay service. A nice feature of online bill pay from

your bank is that you can tell them the day you want the payment to arrive at the payee. We have a date we have agreed on in our operating agreements. We picked a monthly date which is before our regular meeting date.

This means I don’t have to chase down or wait for payments and we have the money to invest already available when we have our meeting. If someone

is not making their monthly contribution, whether they are serious about being in the club or not can be addressed at the meeting.

It’s not just less entries to use one account. Less transactions means less work to reconcile each month and to audit at the end of the year.

It’s not that it’s an insurmountable chore to use a bank account also if clubs want to do that. We prefer to keep things simple and I prefer to spend the time I have

available on investing activities.

Laurie Frederiksen

Arthur Klages on

Re: Matching Bivio with Brokerage Statements and duplicate accounts

I have been treasurer of 2 clubs since Bivio was introduced and have used
Bivio Account Sync for approximately 15 years total, or 180 brokerage
statements.

It is my experience is that when a club uses Bivio the less the treasurer
does the better

I see no reason for two accounts.

Just relax and allow Bivio do the work.

Are you making transcription mistakes? You won't make any because you
usually don't have to make any transcriptions.

The only work I do is to fill in the transaction details of deposits and
checks after they are downloaded.

I must mention that both clubs use Schwab. Their research is excellent and
free, they recently lowered their commissions to $8.95 for all

In reconciling the 180 statements I have had only one error. Schwab credited
us with one less than actual deposit of members checks.

We don't use the odd penny method of identifying member's checks (which is
an excellent idea) but we do keep a record of the numbers of each members
check deposited. Also, the number is also entered in Bivio Accounting after
the deposit transactions are downloaded. This enabled us to quickly identify
the check for which we didn't receive credit.

Tax time is fantastic..for the $99 annual fee the tax returns are easily and
quickly generated.. beats them h--l out of using an accountant or tax
software. Just be certain that during the Tax Interview you correctly
identify any dividends which are not qualified.

Brokerage statements usually state that all of them (except ETFs and Index
funds) are qualified which is not the case.

To be qualified , the stock must be held for 61 days before the dividend
date to be qualified.

This is simple to check...go to Bivio Investments and check each of last
year's dividends against the purchase date. If you hold on to stocks most
dividends will be qualified..if you trade frequently, they will not.

I could wax on about Bivio....but you get the idea.

Arthur Klages, Treas.
Senior Investment Club

-----Original Message-----
From: club_cafe@bivio.com [mailto:club_cafe@bivio.com] On Behalf Of Rob
Nagler
Sent: Monday, March 01, 2010 10:03 PM
To: The Club Cafe
Subject: Re: club_cafe: Single Versus Multiple Club Financial Accounts

On 3/1/10, Lynn Ostrem wrote:
> not use AccountSync because my little broker, Firstrade.com, has not yet
> become affiliated with bivio. Although, I'm sure that will happen in the
> future.

Keep on reminding us. :)

> I have seen plenty of questions on this board from treasurers who are
trying
> to figure out why their bivio accounts don't match up with their
statements.

There are many reasons for this, of course. I should say that our
experience
is that the support costs us much less to support people who use the
automatic
import feature of AccountSync than trying to help people correct manual
entries.
We often have to fix the import software, but it's a fairly simple
matter to correct
the data for automatic import customers. We can't do that for manual entry
folks.

> Does that help clarify?

I think so, but we have always differed on this issue. I suspect neither of
us will be changing our minds soon. :)

Cheers,
Rob

Laurie Frederiksen on

Hi Leo,

How do you know which member sent the check?

This is a good question. We have a simple system so I know whose is whose. Each member has a different number of cents that

they put on the end of their payment. For example, I always add .01, the next member adds .02 etc.

Not only does it make it easy for me to tell whose check is whose, bivio also “learns” who the cents belong to. When the payments are deposited

and I go in to Identify them, bivio will automatically fill in the amount next to the members name who last sent in a check with that number

of cents on it. I just double check and click OK to confirm the payment entry.

Does your broker post that information when he deposits the check?

It’s interesting. With electronic bill payment from members, I found that TD Ameritrade would have the names on some of the entries. I have

not seen the same thing from Folio. However, it doesn’t really matter to me because I can identify the payments by the cents amount.

This can also come in useful if all of your members contribute the same amounts each month. If you mail them all in the same envelope and one gets

displaced by the broker, it is easy to tell whose is missing.

Laurie Frederiksen

Leo Cardillo on

Laurie:

I thought that you might be using the "cents" method! I will try to do the same with Fidelity and see what happens. If our members can send their checks directly to Fidelity, then the combination of AccountSynch and Fidelity will have truly transported this Treasurer to Treasurer's heaven! I'll let you know the outcome.

Best Regards,

Leo

From: club_cafe@bivio.com [mailto:club_cafe@bivio.com] On Behalf Of Laurie Frederiksen
Sent: Tuesday, March 02, 2010 6:29 PM
To: 'The Club Cafe'
Subject: RE: club_cafe: Single Versus Multiple Club Financial Accounts